Owner Alexander calls Rockets draft picks ‘steals’

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Rockets owner Leslie Alexander did not deny he most wanted to come out of Thursday and the draft maneuvers the team had in mind with a franchise star. Always has. Always will.

Instead, he came away with three more rookies and decidedly mixed emotions. But while he said he was “disappointed,” he was “thrilled” with the Rockets’ picks. He called the players the Rockets drafted – Jeremy Lamb, Royce White and Terrence Jones – “steals.” But there was no question the Rockets had other things in mind.

Highway robbery

“It’s both,” Alexander said of the ambivalent feelings after the way the day unfolded and the ways it did not. “It’s a disappointment. You want to move up. But you’re happy you got three great guys. They’re big. Lamb is a real big two. Royce, all our guys love him. They think he will be a real star in this league. (Jones) is huge and he’s young.

“We stole them. We had Lamb as the fifth-best player. We got him. Everybody wanted Royce. I thought at 18, we might not get somebody that terrific, but we did.”

Alexander acknowledged that the long-term – and longtime – goal has been to build around a star, a lesson he learned as soon as he bought the Rockets almost 19 years ago when the Rockets were built around Hakeem Olajuwon

“I started with the Dream,” he said. “It’s always been important. I traded for Clyde Drexler. I traded for Charles Barkley. I traded for Scottie Pippen. I traded for Steve Francis. I traded for Tracy McGrady.”

The value of having a star has never been more apparent than with Olajuwon, but the absence of a star has been nearly as conspicuous as Olajuwon was valuable.

For several entertaining, promising seasons with Yao Ming as the centerpiece star, opposing players shot glances toward Alexander as they made their way past his courtside seat at Toyota Center, trying to send unspoken messages.

“They used to stare at me the whole game because we had another star,” Alexander said. “They would just look at me and stare. Once, one player just sat down next to me. The same players would come back at me the next year after Yao was hurt and wouldn’t even look at me.”

Always changing

The Rockets, he knew, have looked different from every vantage point ever since. Yet, he always disputed the idea that the Rockets have been running in place.

“It’s not going to be the same team,” he said. “We’re going to have more upside.”

Alexander said there is no increase in urgency after three consecutive lottery seasons.

“The emphasis is always to try to be as great as we can every year,” Alexander said. “It doesn’t change. It’s not like this year my thoughts are any different than any other year – zero difference.”

He also believes the only changes needed are on the court.

“I think Daryl (Morey, Rockets general manager) has done a terrific job,” Alexander said. “Why would I want to change? I’m always getting that question for some reason. They expect him to get LeBron James tomorrow. That’s not happening.”

Stay tuned

He said he has “no idea” what might be happening next. The Rockets chose Lamb, White and Jones for their roster but will continue to look to land a franchise player.

“How do I know what the other team is going to do?” Alexander said. “I’m not sitting in somebody else’s shoes. You always talk to this club and that club, and then nobody does anything. It happens all the time.”

There might have been a touch of frustration with that reality, but it was more disappointment. He at least could cheer himself with a draft-night haul – and the next source of hope.

“We still can be players in free agency, too,” Alexander said. “We’ll do something in free agency.”